


Be Close To Me Now In The Aftermath

by Angel Ascending (angel_in_ink)



Category: Rusty Quill Gaming (Podcast)
Genre: Crying, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Gen, Hugs, Kobolds Purr Now, Mild Blood, Sleepy Cuddles, So Does Hamid, So do dragons, Spoilers Through Episode 147
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-25
Updated: 2020-02-25
Packaged: 2021-02-28 03:40:18
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,028
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22887199
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/angel_in_ink/pseuds/Angel%20Ascending
Summary: Wherein Azu gets an invisible hug, Zolf has a moment of self-reflection, Cel gets many ideas, Skraak borrows Hamid's cloak, and Hamid indulges in his more draconic instincts.
Relationships: Celiquillithon "Cel" Sidebottom & Zolf Smith, Hamid Saleh Haroun al-Tahan & Azu, Hamid Saleh Haroun al-Tahan & Skraak, Hamid Saleh Haroun al-Tahan & Zolf Smith, Hamid Saleh Haroun al-Tahan/Azu
Comments: 29
Kudos: 69





	Be Close To Me Now In The Aftermath

**Author's Note:**

> Because I couldn't wait a week for post-fight decompression, conversations, and possible cuddles.
> 
> Special thanks to [Kristsune](http://archiveofourown.org/users/kristsune/pseuds/kristsune) for being my sounding board! <3

Azu staggers as the monstrosity standing before her deals her another blow, cold mist and cold metal striking her face, staggers but does not go down, doesn’t even fall to one knee. She _refuses_ , plain and simple, refuses with all the love she has in her heart. She will not survive another blow like that, she’s sure of it, just as she’s sure that the thing in front of her, wood and metal and glass and fluid replacing blood and bone, will not survive another hit from _her._ It must not.

Azu doesn’t look away from the construct in front of her, just stares into its glowing red eyes and takes a deep breath, hefting her axe for another blow. Several of her attacks have only glanced off metal, and if her next attack does the same, she might not have the chance for another. In this moment she’s not afraid of dying, is only afraid of failing to take this thing down before she goes, afraid that it will live long enough to attack her friends. Out of the corner of her eye she can see Cel’s blood on the floor of the chamber, too red, too bright, too much. She can smell electricity and smoke in the air, the familiar scent of charred leather. How much more damage can Zolf’s body take? If he goes down she can heal him, but if they both go down… And what about Hamid? He hasn’t gotten hit that she remembers (and she _would_ remember, would have counted that as another evil that this creature has done) but she doesn’t know how much magic he has left after all this, and she had seen the fireball that had taken out almost a dozen blobs just roll harmlessly off the construct. How long would he last against this thing with only the smallest of his spells available to him?

Azu strikes again and something in the thing’s leg shatters, fluid spraying out and streaming onto the floor. This time _it_ is the one that staggers, but just like her, it does not fall. Her second blow is not as successful, the clang of metal against metal ringing in her ears.

Time slows as Azu’s vision tunnels. She only barely hears the sound of Zolf’s glaive hitting the construct, impacts that barely leave a mark. The evil before her refuses to fall. But it must. It _must._ She raises her axe again. Her last hit failed. Her next one can not.

_Aphrodite, You who holds all that loves and is loved within Your heart, grant me the strength to wield my weapon and guide my hand so that it strikes true, strikes deep into this thing which has no heart and cannot love. Let love be a weapon to fell the evil before me, and a shield to protect those around me. If this is my last act upon this earth, let it be this, that this evil is defeated and my friends are saved, and may my spirit go into Your heart knowing that I have protected what I love in Your name._

Azu feels warmth flood her heart at the same moment that fire _erupts_ from beside her, bathing the rest of her in heat. She does not cry out in surprise, does not flinch or shy away. She cannot see the source of the fire, but she doesn’t have to. For a moment she’s back in Damascus, watching Hamid destroy a magic mirror with a scream filled with dragon fire, his tears of rage turning to steam as they roll down his cheeks. Hamid is not screaming now, there is only the roar of flames, but Azu knows Hamid’s heart, and she knows what fuels the fire that pours from him, that burns away the monstrous hand that swipes towards the two of them, keeps burning until there is nothing but melted metal and burnt wood and broken glass. She’s a paladin of Aphrodite after all, she knows hearts, and while in this moment his heart is filled with rage, it is also filled with as much love and the desire to protect his friends as her own.

Azu hears Cel give a victory cheer, hears Zolf say something in a congratulatory tone, hears the sound of someone laughing and crying all at once and realizes that it’s _her_. Only now does she fall to her knees, muscles shaking with spent adrenaline. She can’t see Hamid, but she doesn’t have to. She reaches out and he is there, in her arms, breathing hard, his breath still carrying a trace of heat that she can feel even underneath her armor, his arms wrapped around her neck. She can’t see his tears, but she feels the warmth of them sliding along her skin to mix with her blood. She’ll have to do something about the bleeding in a minute, but not now. Holding Hamid and being held is all she has to do right now.

Azu had prayed that love would be a weapon to bring down the evil that would have killed them. She feels her prayer has been answered.

——

So far the walk through Shoin’s underwater tunnel back to the island has been… anticlimactic. Peaceful even. Some might have even thought it was pretty, with the occasional bioluminescent jellyfish swarms seen through the clear glass of the tunnel glowing in the dark water. It’s relatively quiet as well, the only sounds being the group’s footfalls and Cel, who had reverted back to their original form a while ago and whose enthusiastic chatter has quieted down to a fierce muttering about the components they’ll need to make more potions with.

Zolf doesn’t trust it. Any second now they’ll be a trap, or guards behind one of the bulkhead doors, or a metal tentacle will smash through the glass, or— or something. It’s been over an hour of walking and nothing has happened yet, but that doesn’t mean their luck will hold, as much as he hopes it will, as much as they need it to. Hamid’s tapped for everything except the most basic of his spells, and he doesn’t know about Azu, but Zolf doesn’t think he has a lot of healing left in him, not after healing everyone up after that fight. He could probably help take care of some folk’s fatigue a few more times before he runs dry, but that’s all. Cel might have a few more tricks corked up in those vials of theirs, but more than likely any threat they come across will have to be dealt with using crossbows and blades. Or claws, in the case of Skraak.

Zolf stares straight ahead to where Azu and Hamid are walking together, their hands clasped, Skraak draped over the swell of Azu’s shoulder, sleeping. There had been— a bit of a discussion about what to do with Skraak. Leaving them behind in the base hadn’t even been considered, of course, but Zolf had figured they could just go their separate ways once they got back to the island. Apparently Zolf had been the _only_ person who had thought that. Skraak wanted to be with Hamid, Hamid obviously felt protective of Skraak, and Cel and Azu had both agreed that the kobold deserved more than just being abandoned. And Zolf has to admit that it wasn’t as if the kobold hadn’t been _useful._ In the end he had let himself be persuaded. Skraak would have to be quarantined of course, which meant another week of waiting before the next leg of their journey, but Zolf privately is grateful for the excuse of a little bit of down time, the chance to decompress. They all sorely need some time to process everything that’s happened.

Zolf’s gaze drifts down to Azu and Hamid’s joined hands, hers so large that it engulfs his, and his mouth twists into something that’s halfway to being a smile, halfway to being something else, an expression that goes with the feeling in his chest that he hasn’t put a name to yet, hasn’t had the time to. Part of him is still trying to process that Hamid is alive at all, after so long spent mourning him and Sasha, crying for them both on the dark nights when he couldn’t sleep, the nights his old regrets would come whispering in his ear. Sasha is still gone, even if Zolf keeps expecting her to unfold from the shadows at any moment, just like she used to, but Hamid is _here._ He’s changed, yes, changed in ways that Zolf couldn’t have imagined, not just the shape of his jaw, sharper than he remembered, or the shine of brass scales spreading over his neck and the backs of his hands. Not just the fact that apparently he can straight up breathe _fire_ now. Hamid has become _fierce_ in a way that Zolf had only begun to glimpse in Paris, love and loyalty honed as sharp as the edge on Zolf’s glaive.

Wistfulness. That’s what Zolf thinks he’s feeling right now. He wishes he had been there to see Hamid become who he is now. If Zolf had been there, he wouldn’t feel like he’s a bit of an outsider, trying to fit himself back into a team dynamic that’s changed so much. If he had been there, stayed with the team, maybe he could have—

Zolf closes his eyes for a brief moment, breathes in, breathes out. He’s tired, that’s why his thoughts are going down this road again. He _had_ to leave the group when he did, back in Prague. If he hadn’t gone he would have broken under the strain of his crisis of faith and family, he knows that, having broken once before. He had been lucky the first time that he hadn’t been too far gone to pull himself back together into something that was still serviceable, even if there had still been cracks and fault lines deep within his heart. If he had broken again, all that would have been left of him would have been sharp edges and deep pits, things that would hurt people if they got too close. He doesn’t regret leaving, he _had_ to leave to get his head on straight and become a person people could rely on, a person that he _himself_ could rely on. But just because he doesn’t regret leaving doesn’t mean he doesn’t regret the fact that he had to leave in the first place—

Zolf takes another slow breath in and out, running his hand over his face. “Enough of that,” he tells himself quietly. “It’s not helpful.”

The words are met with silence, and Zolf’s glad of that for a moment before he realizes how _quiet_ the tunnel is. Cel’s stopped talking, which Zolf figures would have had to happen sometime and probably isn’t a concern at all. Still, he turns his head to look at them and sees that they’ve fallen half a dozen steps behind, their shoulders hunched slightly and their gaze turned downward towards the floor, a change from earlier when they had been eagerly peering through the glass sides of the tunnel, hoping to catch a glance of the robotic squid. For all that they don’t look anything alike, Cel’s posture makes Zolf think of Sasha so strongly that he has to take a second to compose himself before he drops back to walk beside Cel, clearing his throat softly before speaking.

“Hey. You all right?”

——---

The inside of Cel’s head is a very busy place and a crowded one, ideas for contraptions and lists of alchemical reagents that they need usually in the forefront of their mind while other things jostle for attention in the background, memories of good times and bad ones, the faces of people they’ve left behind, bits of songs they sometimes sing while they work, sense memories of a hundred different places. When they’re working on a project their focus narrows, but even then their mind is racing, filled with chemical equations and numbers, thoughts of times when similar experiments have succeeded or failed. Cel’s aware that most people’s minds don’t work exactly like theirs does, (both scientifically and philosophically speaking no two minds can be alike. Similar yes, but not the same.) all fast thoughts and lightning leaps of logic. Some people probably have tidy, orderly minds. Quiet minds. Cel doesn’t envy them, but they can’t help but wonder what that’s like, because right now their thoughts are very loud.

“Cel?”

Cel’s focus wrenches itself to the world outside their head, away from materials and plans and what if scenarios, leaving them blinking for a moment in silent confusion. Task switching has never been a strength of theirs, and when they’re tired it only becomes worse. They look down at Zolf, who looks back up at them with what they think of as his Concerned face, which they’re beginning to realize is an expression he wears just as much as his Grumpy face. “Sorry, what? Say again?”

“I was asking if you were all right. You were lagging a little bit and you’d gone… quiet. Didn’t know if you were just tired or if you were still hurt or— or something else.”

“Well tired, I mean, we’re all _tired_ ,” Cel says quickly. “But it’s not like taking a nap in a scientist’s underwater base was even an option, I get it. We’d go to sleep and wake up strapped to tables with Shoin’s secret apprentice who no one knew about looming over us like something out of a pulp magazine.”

“Or wake up in a tank with a tube down your throat and both your legs off,” Zolf mutters.

“That’s— that’s a very specific example.” Cel looks down at Zolf, at the gleam of metal shining through the charred bits of his trousers.

“Some day when we’re _not_ escaping from a mad scientist’s lair I’ll tell you about Paris,” Zolf says. “Over a drink. Several drinks.”

“Going to hold you to that,” Cel says. “And I’m not a big fan of the term ‘mad scientist,’ at least in a general sense because, well, we all have our quirks. I myself am at least—“ Cel considers, doing some internal maths. “Maybe fifty percent quirks, give or take five percent. But I _might_ make an exception for Shoin. Seriously, who thinks putting their brain in a tank is a good idea? Brains belong in bodies. Bodies are great! Who would want to give up things like taste buds and nerve endings just to float around in a tank and power some flashy alchemical pipe organ construct _anyway_?”

_A flashy alchemical pipe organ construct that almost killed you_. The thought drifts to the forefront of Cel’s mind, not for the first time since that fight. _You didn’t even make a dent in it._

It’s not that Cel feels _useless_. They have self confidence in spades, and can think of at least a dozen times tonight (it feels like months have passed, but it was only one night. It doesn’t seem possible.) that they contributed positively to one of the many fights they were a part of. _Everyone_ had done amazing things tonight! They just feel like—

“Okay, there it is again,” Zolf says. “I _know_ that facial expression. You’ve got the post-battle sulks, right? Feel like you didn’t contribute enough there at the end? Because I’m telling you right now—“

“I could have done more—” Cel begins to protest, but Zolf holds up a hand, cutting them off.

“No you couldn’t have,” Zolf says, and his voice is firm but gentle. “And that’s not a criticism, that’s just a fact. If you’d had anything left you would have done it, same as me. That place—“ Zolf waves a hand behind them, indicating where they’ve come from. “That place was _designed_ to make people use up resources. Same with that _thing_ that Shoin made himself into. We were _all_ pretty much tapped by the time we got to that room. Except for Azu, I suppose. I saw that look in her eyes, she would have been swinging that axe with her last breath. And Hamid—I didn’t even know he could _do_ that. So they took down the big bad, and we took care of the rest. That’s important too! You were hurt and you knew better than to go getting yourself killed by throwing yourself against an enemy you couldn’t affect. You hung back and did what you could against the blobs. You fought _smart_.”

“Thank you!” Cel says, some of their enthusiasm returning with the compliment. They realize suddenly that they’re slouching and they straighten up with a wince. Bits of them still ache from all the fighting and the damage they took, but it’s nothing that a few hours sleep won’t fix. “There’s room for improvement though.”

Zolf shrugs, and Cel watches their mouth curve up at the corners and turn into a rare, wry smile. “I mean, that’s what life’s about, isn’t it? Always room for improvement.”

_Really need to figure out how to see in the dark. There has to be a way to make a potion just for that. If I could isolate the elements from my beast morph mutagen that give me darkvision, if I could concentrate that somehow. And I need to figure out how to take more hits. Armor? Armor is heavy. What if there was some sort of armor you could ride in? Like the tank I was building, except person shaped? Like Shoin’s pipe-organ thing except_ **_better_ ** _obviously, no brains in tanks. How could you power it though? Elementals? And I’d need metal. A_ **_lot_ ** _of metal._

“Metal for what?” Zolf asks as Cel reaches for the notebook they keep in one of the many inner pockets of their coat, along with a pen of their own design.

“Did my inner monologue become an outer one again? That happens sometimes.”

Zolf chuckles. “It happens more often than you think.” He gives a little nod toward the notebook. “So, what idea have you come up with this time?”

Cel grins. “Okay, so I was thinking—“

———

It’s been a long and exciting night for Skraak. They’ve gone from a guard to a general for one, have thrown their old allegiances aside to follow someone obviously superior, and have been accepted into a brand new tribe. It’s a much smaller tribe then he’s used to, but that’s all right. It’s a good, strong, tribe, and Hamid is a good leader, a good warrior, a good protector.

And right now Hamid is angry. Hamid is angry and it has something to do with them, and something to do with the man in the room they’ve just left, the man behind the desk with the scar that twists his mouth (it’s a good scar of course, all scars are good), the man who smells like paper and ink and not like a dragon at all and yet seems to be Hamid’s _boss_ somehow. There had been a lot of talking Skraak hadn’t been able to understand, and then the talking had gotten very loud and then the man behind the desk had stood up and walked toward Hamid, all tall and loud and Skraak had done what any good general would do—

“Sorry,” Skraak says again, ducking their head even lower, rubbing their jaw against Hamid’s shoulder and making an apologetic trilling sound in the back of their throat. They’re not apologizing for defending Hamid, for moving between him and the other man, for baring their teeth and snarling their most threatening snarl. They’re apologizing for the fact that their claws had not drawn blood, that the only thing shredded had been the man’s fancy clothes.

“It’s all right, Skraak,” Hamid tells them, and the words still sound a little bit strange, the language of dragons coming out of a mouth that doesn’t have the proper sharp teeth and pointed tongue for it. “I’m not mad at you. No one is mad at you. Except Oscar maybe, and he can just— he can just get over it.” Hamid sighs, and Skraak instinctually makes a different sound, softer, one meant to soothe, to calm.

Cel says something Skraak doesn’t understand. To be fair, Skraak only knows a handful of words that aren’t the language of dragons. Yes. No. Food. Stand. Guard. Fight. Kill. Whatever Cel says, it’s not any of those words. It sounds happy though, and it makes Hamid laugh and relax a little, so that’s good. Skraak likes Cel, who seems to understand how important it is to touch people, and who is missing part of an ear, an excellent warrior scar. Cel smells like science, but they haven’t poked Skraak with the needles that make their thoughts confused and slow, not like other science smelling people. Sometimes Cel has sharp teeth and claws and wings and it’s not as good as being a dragon, but Skraak doesn’t hold that against them.

They come to a set of stairs, but when Skraak moves to go down them, Hamid stops them. The whole group of them stand in the hallway as Skraak blinks up at Hamid, confused. Hamid is frowning again, and when he says something that sounds angry and sad all at once, it’s Zolf that answers, putting a hand on Hamid’s shoulder while handing him a small key.

Skraak can’t smell any emotions besides fear, but if they could, they are sure Zolf would reek of sadness. Instead Zolf smells like salt and science metal, of ozone and burnt leather. Every time Zolf takes a step Skraak can hear the bearings in Zolf’s legs shifting, hear gears ticking away, fluids moving through tubes. Zolf is the strongest warrior of this small tribe, to have survived not only the loss of one limb, but two. Not only that, but Zolf has magic that makes people feel better, that smells like faint ocean breezes and freedom. His place in the tribe must be a high one, and Skraak wonders what would make such an honored and valued warrior so filled with sorrow.

Hamid sighs again and turns to Skraak, putting his hands on Skraak’s shoulders. Skraak tilts their head, rubbing their jaw against Hamid’s sleeve, making sure Hamid properly smells like them.

“Skraak? I have something to tell you, so I want you to listen to me very carefully, all right? It’s very important.”

Skraak straightens up immediately, nodding enthusiastically as they do so. They listen as Hamid starts talking about some sort of disease that everyone had to be checked for, about how, if Skraak wants to stay with them, they have to be checked for it too, have to be kept in a room separate from everyone else for a week, a room with bars between them and anyone who comes to visit.

“I don’t want to have to lock you up,” Hamid says, and the breath from those words carries heat with it. “We didn’t have to lock _Cel_ up. But Oscar refuses to—“

“It’s all right,” Skraak says quickly, and it’s only a little bit of a lie. They don’t _want_ to be separated from Hamid. Skraak should be beside Hamid always, protecting him, helping to protect everyone else too of course, but Hamid especially. But Skraak should have known that joining a new tribe wouldn’t be easy, that there would be some sort of test or trial involved. They puff out their chest and stand a little straighter, like a good general should. “I can do it!”

Hamid smiles at Skraak. Skraak hasn’t known Hamid for long but they know this smile well, the sort of worried sort of sad smile. “Of course you can. Do— do you want to say goodbye— goodnight to everyone, before we go? They’ll come visit you tomorrow, I’m sure.”

Skraak nods and immediately goes over to Cel, who goes to their knees and has their arms open for a hug before Skraak has even halfway crossed the space between them. Cel holds them tight and gives a little laugh when Skraak rubs their cheek against Cel’s own. Cel even returns the gesture, though the half-elf don’t have any scent glands to mark them with, it doesn’t make the gesture any less affectionate.

Skraak doesn’t try to hug Zolf and Zolf doesn’t try to hug Skraak, and that’s fine. When Skraak puts out their hand, Zolf gives him a proper warrior forearm clasp and a nod of respect, which Skraak returns, and that’s enough for the both of them.

Even kneeling Azu is tall, taller than Cel even. Skraak doesn’t throw themselves into Azu’s hug with the same enthusiasm as they had done for Cel’s, doesn’t rub her cheek against theirs. They’re a little jealous of Azu, and they know they shouldn’t be. Just because she’s a general too, always by Hamid’s side, close enough that Azu’s own sweat and metal smell mixes with Hamid’s. She’s been here longer than Skraak has, has obviously earned that closeness. The look in her eyes when she had fought against Shoin (who had not been gigantic and made of lightning, but had been something else just as strange) had been the look of a warrior who held no fear of death. It’s no wonder that Hamid stays close to her.

When Skraak steps back from her hug, they looks at Azu, then point at Hamid. “Guard,” Skraak says, the English word strange and flat in their mouth, carrying none of the nuance they would have been able to convey in their own tongue, about how precious the person Skraak wants Azu to guard is. She knows it though, Skraak can see it there in her eyes.

Azu nods solemnly. “Yes,” she says, and her voice sounds, as always, like the noise kobolds make to soothe and quiet one another when they are hurt or sad. It sounds like her healing magic feels, and Skraak can appreciate Hamid’s choice of constant companion, even if they are still a little jealous.

Hamid and Skraak descend the dark stairs together. Even the lights Hamid creates with the wave of his hand doesn’t light the space strongly enough that Skraak has to squint. Skraak’s eyes are strong in the darkness, stronger than Hamid’s, but the lights of the inn above had made them burn and ache.

“I’ll come see you as often as I can,” Hamid says. “You won’t have to be alone _very_ much.”

“It’s all right,” Skraak insists again. They don’t want Hamid to worry about them. Skraak is brave! Skraak can be alone for awhile if that’s what has to happen so they can be a part of the tribe for always.

“And I can teach you more English,” Hamid says as they descend the last of the stairs. “So you’ll have an easier time talking to our friends.”

“Should teach them Draconic instead,” Skraak says, and Hamid chuckles.

“You could probably get Cel to agree to that,” Hamid says. “I think they’d love to learn a new language.”

Skraak thinks back to Cel’s beast form. In that shape they’d probably have the proper sort of mouth and tongue for the hisses and slides of certain words, the proper teeth to lend other words their sharpness. The rest of the time, well, they’d just have to make due.

There’s a door and then there’s a room, not too big and not too small, one wall made of bars, no windows anywhere. Beyond the bars is another area with a bed, and Skraak can smell the faint traces of Zolf even from where they stand.

“Do you need anything?” Hamid asks. “Besides something to sleep on. And food of course. We all need food. And sleep. And a bath.”

Skraak _does_ want to ask for something. They duck their head, feeling both subservient and suddenly shy, and tug on Hamid’s cloak.

“Yes?” Hamid says gently, and Skraak tugs on the cloak again.

“This. Can I—?”

“My cloak of Elvenkind? The magic won’t work down here, it—“

“Smells like you,” Skraak says softly.

“Oh,” Hamid says, just as softly. “Of course. That’s— that’s important, isn’t it?” Hamid says it like it’s something he hadn’t known, as if it’s a memory that has just come back to him.

Skraak only nods as Hamid removes the cloak and drapes it around Skraak’s shoulders, pulling Skraak into a hug at the same time.

“It’ll be all right,” Hamid whispers, and it sounds more like he’s trying to reassure himself of that fact instead of comforting Skraak.

Skraak doesn’t say anything, just rubs their cheek against Hamid’s, smooth skin and warm bronze scales sliding gently over Skraak’s own scaled hide. Hamid smells like heat, like smoke, like safety and protection. Skraak can’t help the deep rumbling sound they make in their chest, the sound that means happiness and contentment, just like they can’t help the way they smile when Hamid makes it back, can’t help the shiver of acceptance that runs though them. How could Skraak ever feel lonely with the memory of this sound, this smell, this _warmth_ to keep them company? Seven days will be nothing.

———

Hamid finishes drying himself off from his bath, prestidigitating the rest of the water away from his hair with a wave of his hand. It’s a wonder he hadn’t fallen asleep in the warm water, to be honest, hadn’t fallen asleep during the meal that Zolf had scrounged from odds and ends in the inn’s kitchen. It feels like he is always having to redefine what being tired means. It used to mean an extra cup of coffee in the morning during finals, or tumbling out of a casino at sunrise with more or less coin in his pocket than when he started and falling into bed for a few hours before getting up and doing it all again. It wasn’t until he had become a mercenary that he had learned that you could be so tried it _hurt_ , could push yourself into exhaustion so hard that you’d _see_ things. He’s at the point where things are just the tiniest bit fuzzy around the edges, where doing up the buttons on his green silk pajamas seems like an impossible task. He stops halfway up, throwing a robe on for the sake of modesty, though he doubts anyone else is up to be scandalized by the sight of his bare chest.

Sure enough, there is no one walking the inn’s halls, and the rooms Hamid passes are quiet and dark. He can just see the faintest bit of light coming from his own room, and he smiles as he quietly opens the door. There’s an oil lamp burning low on the small table next to the door, and that warm light bathes Azu in a gentle glow as she sleeps, her hands curled under her chin. Hamid can’t help but keep smiling at the sight of her, not at all surprised that she hadn’t waited up for him, not that he had wanted her to. She needed the rest same as he did, if not more, after tonight.

Hamid slides the door closed behind him and slips out of his robe before extinguishing the light. It’s ten steps to his side of the bed in the dark, and he’s just getting under the covers when he hears Azu shift and roll over.

“Sorry,” he whispers. “I didn’t mean to wake you.”

“Come here,” is all she says, and then her arms are around him and he’s tucked up against the warmth and muscle of her, her pink cotton nightgown shifting against his green silk pajamas. Hamid sighs, feeling the tension of the day beginning finally, finally, to leave him.

It had started in that room under the inn. In the cage. In the dark, her body curled around his, his hand over hers.

No. That’s wrong. It had started in Rome. So many things had ended in Rome, but there was one thing that had started there. They had lost so many things in Rome, but this was one thing that had been found. This comfort. He remembers the bitterly dark shadows and their icy chill, remembers curling up against Azu, how he had wished he could will his small body into giving off more heat so that she could be warm. He remembers Sasha curled up on the other side of Azu, her body folded in on itself under her cloak, all sharp lines and angles. How she hadn’t complained about the cold, how she—

Hamid pushes that thought gently aside. Not tonight. He can’t deal with those memories tonight, not when so much has happened. He tries to empty his mind instead, to focus on the sound of Azu’s heartbeat, steady and strong and as good as a lullaby.

The night that they had been free of their quarantine, Hamid had gone to bed alone, the same as Azu had. He had been freshly bathed then too, and when he had slipped between the equally clean sheets with a sigh he had thought, foolishly perhaps, that he would sleep well. Hours later he had woken in bed with a gasp, tears on his pillow, shivering in the dark as hard as if he had been back in the cold shadows of Rome, feeling like a part of himself was missing. He had been stumbling out of bed and opening the door before he had even been aware of the voice he had been hearing on the other side, the soft, tear choked whispering of his name. He still remembers how hard his heart had pounded when he had opened the door to see her there, the tears streaming down her face mirroring his own. They haven’t slept apart since.

“You’re warm,” Azu mumbles into his hair.

“Too warm?” His insides feel almost hot, as if the dragon fire has heated him from the inside out. Maybe it has. His scales are spreading as well, he noticed that in the bath, bronze freckles against the brown of his skin, shying away from the spiral scar that runs down the one shoulder.

“Just right,” Azu assures him.

They haven’t put a name to what this is, the comfort they take from their joined hands in the daylight, the safety they feel when they’re curled up together in the dark. They don’t have to. Hamid wonders if the followers of Aphrodite have a hundred names for love. They must, because love can mean so many things, be found in so many places. Sasha’s rare, wry little smiles. Zolf’s gruff concern. Grizzop’s fierce protective nature. Cel’s tireless enthusiasm. The way Skraak’s eyes shine when they look at him. The warmth of Azu’s arms. The fire in Hamid’s heart.

“Hamid?” Azu sounds a little more awake now. “Hamid, are you _purring_?”

Hamid realizes then that he’s been hearing a sound for a few minutes now, a soft, low rumble. Of course, now that Azu’s drawn attention to it, it stops. “Ummmm. Maybe? Skraak was doing it earlier.” He remembers echoing that purr with his own, not even thinking about it, as if it had been instinct. “I think— maybe I picked it up from them? Or maybe— I’m just becoming more dragon-y?”

“Hmmm. Are you going to start hoarding things next?” Azu’s voice is full of teasing, sleepy affection. “Gold? Shiny things? Books?”

Hamid lays his hand over Azu’s collarbone, over the smooth skin that hours before had been torn, how the sight of her blood spilling over her armor, dimming the bright pink glow, had been the last spark that had ignited the flame inside of him, had unleashed the rage that had been kindling in his heart, because how _dare_ Shoin try to take her from him, how _dare_ he hurt Hamid’s friends, who was _he_ to try and take away the people that Hamid loved?

“I think I have everything I need,” Hamid says, and feels Azu chuckle softly as she places her hand over his.

“Go to sleep, dragon boy,” Azu says softly, and Hamid smiles as he closes his eyes.

**Author's Note:**

> You can read Azu and Hamid's relationship as either deeply platonic or as romantic, however you like, gods know I go back and forth on the regular. (I'm a multi-shipper. I have so many ships. So many.)
> 
> I’m [angel-ascending](http://angel-ascending.tumblr.com) over on Tumblr and [angel_in_ink](http://twitter.com/angel_in_ink) over on Twitter if y’all want to stop by and say hi!


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